Manchester City

[ChesterDave]

UEFA could look at more recent sponsorship deals

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2020/feb/18/manchester-city-could-face-new-uefa-investigation-into-abu-dhabi-sponsors-football

Meanwhile on Bluemoon

[Shaggy]

Gloves are off

[ame]https://twitter.com/ManCity/status/1230114917107322880[/ame]

[Chris]

The arrogance and refusal to just admit it is pretty sick isn’t it? Absolutely vile club.

They simply have to be relegated after this but it won’t happen.

[Buzzo]

Hilarious choice for his first interview. He was never really going to have his feet held to the flames by CityTV.

All they seem to have is the accusation of corruption and impropriety. Accounting is black and white the numbers tell the story. If the rules back them up, then they are ****ed no matter how much they cry corruption.

[Sus]

Hilarious choice for his first interview. He was never really going to have his feet held to the flames by CityTV.

All they seem to have is the accusation of corruption and impropriety. Accounting is black and white the numbers tell the story. If the rules back them up, then they are ****ed no matter how much they cry corruption.

Exactly. They're complaining about how unfair the rules are as a justification for their cheating. If you don't like UEFA rules, then don't compete in their competitions.

Seems pretty simple to me

[Skrtelmania]

Saracens were a bit like this in terms of completely denying everything weren't they?

Right up until the point that they admitted it, apologised and accepted their draconian punishment...somehow get the feeling that City will never do this under any circumstances!

[Buzzo]

The thing with Saracens is their punishment increased exponentially. They spent some time considering fighting the allegations and then as you say gave up.

What is interesting, as it was with Saracens is, are City currently operating within FFP. And if they changed, why?

[dom9]

The thing with Saracens is their punishment increased exponentially. They spent some time considering fighting the allegations and then as you say gave up.

What is interesting, as it was with Saracens is, are City currently operating within FFP. And if they changed, why?

They've definitely reigned in their spending (look at their defence), and they are making a profit, so they probably are playing by the rules now that they've got their position with the big boys stabilised (for now).

But who knows really.

They've changed their stance too. Less of the "we're doing what we want and we'll just sue everybody until we get our way" attitude and more of "we've done nothing wrong within the rules, and are victims of a prejudicial process."

Their defence seems to be based on the back of leaks. Leaks of hacked documents, and leaks of the process whilst it was ongoing. And yet they were just as culpable when it came to of the record briefings.

So I think they're changing their strategy, and generally being a lot more careful with what they are saying.

Could you call that a compromise with a view to meeting UEFA in the middle? That's one possible way of looking at it I suppose.

[Buzzo]

I assume the irrefutable evidence is the doctored books?

They have obviously seen sponsorship as a way around FFP and given they own the sponsor and the club have felt it would be easy to manipulate the books. Ultimately that link up is where FFP can falls down. State owned club sponsored by state owned airline.

[Buzzo]

They've definitely reigned in their spending (look at their defence), and they are making a profit, so they probably are playing by the rules now that they've got their position with the big boys stabilised (for now).

But who knows really.

They've changed their stance too. Less of the "we're doing what we want and we'll just sue everybody until we get our way" attitude and more of "we've done nothing wrong within the rules, and are victims of a prejudicial process."

Their defence seems to be based on the back of leaks. Leaks of hacked documents, and leaks of the process whilst it was ongoing. And yet they were just as culpable when it came to of the record briefings.

So I think they're changing their strategy, and generally being a lot more careful with what they are saying.

Could you call that a compromise with a view to meeting UEFA in the middle? That's one possible way of looking at it I suppose.

I wonder how much of an admission of guilt is the realisation they needed to compromise and play by the rules? Given they are also saying they have never broken the rules.

[dom9]

I assume the irrefutable evidence is the doctored books?

They have obviously seen sponsorship as a way around FFP and given they own the sponsor and the club have felt it would be easy to manipulate the books. Ultimately that link up is where FFP can falls down. State owned club sponsored by state owned airline.

Who knows.

[Buzzo]

Who knows.

Hopefully UEFA and the PL.

[RichC]

My gut feeling is they'll position their defence on UEFA not doing things by the letter of the law and look to get away with things on a technicality. The stuff that is out there about them and has been reported upon by publications that aren't known to sensationalise like some of the red tops for instance leads to the thinking they're guilty as hell and they probably know it.

Whether UEFA have gone about things by the book though will be another matter entirely and based on past performance I'd be surprised if they've not ****ed this in some way

[Pablo]

They've definitely reigned in their spending (look at their defence), and they are making a profit, so they probably are playing by the rules now that they've got their position with the big boys stabilised (for now).

They'd have been far better using this as their defence. "We ****ed up but we're behaving ourselves now". That would probably have got the ban reduced to one season.

Instead they've done the opposite. Their all in. Let's see who's bluffing.

[Kenneth]

Privileged billionaire princes probability don't do contrition very well. Not used to not getting everything they want or being sanctioned.